By Vitali Shaposhnikov: As the Mayweather Jr. and Pacquiao drama escalades, so do the various statements from the respective teams. The potential of fight has not only become one of the most anticipated and sought after, but also the most convoluted in terms of speculations and assumed lies.
The core question for why this fight has not yet happened and why it is being avoided is: who is stalling the fight? Is Bob Arum trying to hang on to his cash cow for as long as he possibly can? Is Manny Pacquiao trying to avoid Mayweather Jr. for whatever reason? Or is maybe Floyd all talk and no walk? Nobody has the real answer, and I can promise you, nobody will ever know.
Looks like the people from TMZ got in touch with Freddie Roach, and he has informed them that Manny Pacquiao could finally decide if Mayweather Jr. will be his next opponent in May within the next 48 hours (http://www.tmz.com/2012/01/11/manny-pacquiao-floyd-mayweather-fight-freddie-roach/#.Tw5KeYGz-_0). Roach also seemed to be personally hurt by Floyd calling Manny a “Punk” in his recent Tweet update: “He should look in the mirror. He’s been ducking us for 2 years,” said Roach.
On another note, according to PhilBoxcing.com (http://philboxing.com/news/story-65092.html) Manny Pacquiao and Michael Koncz both voiced the fact that it is Mayweather Jr. they hope to fight in May: “We are not ducking the fight. From a business perspective we are not going to throw away an additional $30-$40 million. Be a man (Floyd) and step up to the plate. Fight at the end of May and the fight is done.”
Bob Arum, of course, had his own word to throw around, saying “They have already agreed to fight Robert Guerrero on May 5. They feel that if they blame Manny and myself for the Pacquiao-Mayweather not happening and therefore they are fighting Guerrero and that somehow the public will excuse them and buy the Mayweather-Guerrero fight. That is stupid. Nobody is going to buy the fight unless they believe it’s a good fight. The fact that I did this or Manny did that is not going to make a guy buy or not buy a Mayweather-Guerrero fight.”
Arum also touched on his previous point of building a proper venue for such a big event: “They want to grab some quick bucks fighting a non-dangerous opponent, go to jail if Mayweather has to, come out and then go right into a big fight with Manny Pacquiao. They know we got to have time to build that outdoor stadium because that can bring to the bottom line an additional $30-$40 million. That becomes a big percentage of the total estimated gross.”
I have to say, it is very hard to argue with Arum on this specific topic of having the right venue for one of the most important fights in boxing history. A fight in Las Vegas, in any of the current available arenas, would leave too many people without a ticket to the fight. Any arena, of any imaginable size, would undoubtedly sell out in a matter of minutes. So, since each fighter expects to get paid around $100 million for their bout, there needs to be somewhere for the money to come from.
As far as his comments on Mayweather Jr. and his next opponent being Robert Guerrero, seems like Arum is either truly confused, or just ran out of things to say. If the fight was indeed good to go, we would know about it. Guerrero himself would have already started to self promote his fight, and pop up in the news all over the place. Is there a possibility of that fight happening? Sure, there most definitely is, but it has not yet been finalized.
I wonder what the day will bring tomorrow…